Schadenfreude, Glenn Beck, And Conservatives

You know, Glenn, it's finally time to start dealing with reality:

Losing a presidential election is always tough, but this one was presented to them in unusually apocalyptic terms. Obama was a closet socialist. He was un-American. He wanted to destroy capitalism. He's been responsible for endless economic misery. He's left America open to attack from foreign enemies. He wants to immiserate small business owners in order to distribute goodies to poor people. He engineered a total government takeover of the healthcare industry. He deliberately allowed four brave Americans to die in Benghazi and then ruthlessly covered it up. He wants to outlaw churches. He wants to take away your guns. Etc. On Fox News last night, there was palpable disbelief from right-wing pundits that he could possibly have won. They thought Mitt Romney should have been able to blow Obama out of the water in a massive defeat, and the fact that he didn't meant the Republican Party ought to commit ritual suicide to pay for its world historic incompetence.

...A relative told me last night about a friend who's literally afraid that her life savings are now in danger because Obama was reelected. James Fallows has been following the story of a small businessman who says it's over: he's going to close up shop now that Obama is back in office. All of these people believe that Obama is something close to a dystopian antichrist. And yet....a majority of Americans decided to put him back in office. If Obama really is the guy you've been told he is, that's not just inexplicable, it's nothing short of criminal.

So what happens now? What happens when churches continue to thrive, the economy recovers, Obamacare turns out to be a fairly benign expansion of healthcare coverage, taxes don't change much, and America doesn't find itself under foreign occupation?

What does 'One Hand Clapping' think of this? I stopped reading him in 2003, when it was clear he was in the bag for Bush's Iraq war, but immediately after 9/11 he seemed sensible enough (for a conservative). Interestingly, his thoughts echo mine, except he's utterly depressed, while I'm utterly ecstatic, about the turn of events:

The short answer: the 2012 election forms a Rubicon that, now having been crossed, this country will never cross back. Forget all the pundit talk (like Ed Rollins this morning on Fox) that elections go through cycles and this one was just another example. Forget the mid-terms of 2010. Forget the Tea party; it's finished forever.

The basic, fundamental nature and character of the American electorate has changed, and will not be changed back. Ever. The Republican Party can foresee nothing but diminishment henceforth. There are no rising superstars who can save it. Jindal? Nope. Rubio? Nope. Rand Paul? Nope. Paul Ryan? He's done already. And there is absolutely no Republican whom Romney ran against in the primaries who has a ghost of a chance in the future.

...The Republican Party cannot stay true to its historical principles and win again. For most of the last eight decades, the American Left has taken over, successively, American political theory, opinion leaders, university academia, the media, mainline churches, public education and finally the entire Democrat party. They Left has suffered only rare and temporary setbacks in their Great March. Now it is ensconced and it is permanent. Generations younger than the retiring Boomers literally do not have the historical knowledge or intellectual tools to grasp the concept of inherently limited government and restricted, delegated powers.

...I am tempted to say that only a severe national-security crisis will turn the electorate toward a Republican candidate again. But I yield not to that temptation.

Goodbye, party of Lincoln. It was fun while it lasted. Last one out turn out the lights.